dvd with menus

i am posting this here because im not quite sure which forum to post it in. Well i have decided to make a "yearbook dvd" for this upcoming school year but i am not sure how big of a task i am heading into. I have a digital camcorder and i am beggining to do research on making dvd movies. i want to make a dvd with menus and submenus. I am hoping someone can give me any tips or advances towards what to do, which programs to use, or better yet, what not to do. if anyone knows of any webistes or can give me any links where i can find tutorials that would be great. well thank you in advanced and i hope someone can give me some advice. thanks..

 

First, you'll need to get your footage from the cam to the computer.
Second, you'll need to encode it to mpeg-2, DVD compliant file.
Third, you'll need an editor to cut up the clips, join clips, add fades, effects, etc.
Fourth, you'll need something like DVDLab to author it with chapters and menus.
Fifth, you'll need a good DVD burning program.

WinDV for capturing the footage (digital) to the computer.
Mainconcept, Canopus, CCE, or tmpgenc to encode it.
Sony Vegas for editing.
DVDLab Pro for authoring.
Nero for burning.

There are lots of other apps, and lots of other opinions, these are just my suggestions.

 

thanks for the reply.. i just have one finaly question. with those programs i should be able to setup the dvd into chapters also? so that when i press next chapter button on the remote itll go to the next chapter?? thanks

 

Chapters and menu's are all done in DVDLab, that's what "Authoring" is.

 

if i want to buy a new digital cam corder are there things i have to ask about it as in wat type of file it stores the footage in or anything??

 

DVcams store video in DV format, which you can (usually) get onto the computer in DV-AVI format, using firewire and software.
There are a few programs that will capture the DV and encode it to mpeg-2 automatically, but this requires a very robust computer.